1.2.13-Kcrabb88
Brick Club 1.2.13-Petit Gervais *cues the epic musical transition from “Valjean’s Soliloquy” to “At the End of the Day.” * Wow, this chapter always manages to break my heart into a thousand tiny pieces. The “then his heart swelled, and he burst into tears. It was the first time he had wept for nineteen years” bit just speaks such volumes to me, and I almost feel like not crying for THAT long of a time would be almost like a shock to the system. Valjean is probably weeping for a number of reasons here, I think; he’s weeping at what he’s just done, he’s weeping at who he’s become, he’s weeping at all the injustices done to him, he’s weeping because he just doesn’t yet know how to handle what the Bishop did. I can’t get through this without getting a little teary myself. The paragraph that strikes me the most is definitely Hugo’s explanation of Valjean’s reaction to the Bishop’s actions, when he says “being just out of that misshapen and gloomy thing which is called the galleys, the bishop had hurt his soul, as too vivid a light would have hurt his eyes on coming out of the dark. The future life, the possible life that was offered to him thenceforth, all pure and radiant, filled him with trembling and anxiety.” Just WOW. What a vivid and fantastic look into Valjean here, and just a great look into the reaction of perhaps anyone who has experienced something truly terrible, truly horrific, and is then faced with the possibility of something wonderful, faced with the possibility of a new life. It is incredibly difficult, I think, after going through something awful (especially something like what Valjean experienced because that’s one of the worst things I’ve ever heard) it would be much easier to turn one’s heart to stone, as Valjean essentially does, in order to protect oneself against the world. If one hopes, if one tries, those hopes can be dashed and you can fail. And in stealing sort of passively from Petit Gervais, it as if Valjean attempts to remain the person he was, but in the face of a simple act of human compassion and kindess, he just cannot. He cannot be the person he was, and instead chooses here, to face the possibility of a new life, of a reinvented identity, even with the persistent fear that he will be caught and thrown back into the horror of the galleys, and he wants to spread that burgeoning sense of hope he’s been given to other people, as he proves through the rest of the novel. But this chapter, I swear, just all the emotions. It is interesting that this isn’t really in any adaptations. I wonder if that’s because so much of it is internally going on inside Valjean? I mean, they could show the bit with the light and the images flashing in front of his eyes, I suppose, but it’s Hugo’s descriptions of Valjean’s inner turmoil that make this scene work so well for me, and I don’t know how well that would translate to a screen or a stage, much as I adore this scene. Although I would be interested to see how they incorporated it, should someone try.